London has been battered by 50mph winds that have felled trees and caused travel chaos. Powerful gusts swept across the capital as the Met Office issued a yellow "be aware" weather alert for most of the country.

In contrast, the report says: “Tory cabinet ministers of the Major era included Robert Cranbourne, now the Marquess of Salisbury, who is valued at £275 million, and Lord Heseltine at £264 million.”

It adds: “The number of MPs who have registrable shareholdings is small. MPs’ outside earnings have also fallen dramatically. It also used to be common for MPs to continue to pursue their careers from before entering Parliament.

“A few still do. Jacob Rees-Mogg is paid £11,000 per month by the investment company he helped to found. Geoffrey Cox, Edward Garnier and Stephen Phillips still practise as QCs: the latter still derives substantial earnings from this. They are, however, very much the exception, not the rule.”

Deloitte goes stellar with its Comet fees

A lot can happen in six minutes during a retail administration. At least, that is one conclusion to be drawn from Deloitte’s “administrator’s progress report” on the electricals retailer Comet.

The accountancy firm said: “During the six-month period covered by this report, we have incurred total time costs of £9,184,636 made up of 17,581 hours at an average charge-out rate of £522 across all grades of staff, this time is charged in six-minute increments.”

A Deloitte spokesman previously said of its fees on Comet: “The figures reflect the accepted rate for a complex administration.”

Freelance journalists, who are typically paid by the word, please look away.

* Bank of England Deputy Governor Paul Tucker’s letter of resignation to George Osborne began: “Dear Chancellor.” The significance? Tucker didn’t write: “Dear George.” Those in the know reckon he still feels very sore that the Treasury did nothing to squash speculation that he was the favourite to be Bank Governor, when Osborne was quietly lining up Canadian Mark Carney to get the role. Osborne ended his letter of reply “best wishes, George” and praised Tucker’s “towering contribution”. A pang of guilt, George?

* So Tucker is off to spend some time in American academia. Perhaps he will run into former Barclays boss Bob Diamond, whom Tucker described as a “brick” during the credit crunch when, it subsequently emerged, Diamond’s bankers had been fixing Libor.

* Independent broker Numis Securities’ golden run continues, after a couple of lean years, as it worked on a hat-trick of fundraising for three London companies in the space of 24 hours last week. There was a £25.5 million placing for health firm Retroscreen Virology, a £51.2 million one for student accommodation company Unite and £68.5 million one for real estate investment trust Primary Health Properties. That looks like clear evidence that stock markets are looking up, despite global jitters in the past fortnight.